The Battle of Saipan of 1944
Summer is the season for Japan to remember the war against the US over the Pacific Ocean that had been conducted between 1941 and 1945.
One of the most remembered battle fields is Saipan Island. At the time, namely in June 1944, the Imperial Government in Tokyo led by Prime Minister/Army General Hideki Tojyo asserted that the island could well stand American assaults, since it was well fortified and a few divisions were stationed with support of hundreds of Zero fighters and other military planes. However the US sent twice larger number of soldiers and used ten times larger ammunition with cover by more than 1,000 fighters and bombers and 20 battle ships and cruisers.
The defeat in Saipan led to Tojo's resignation from premiership one month after the battle. Most of Japanese elites understood that they lost this Pacific War, though it took one more year for the Empire of Japan to surrender.
The Battle of Saipan was a battle of the Pacific campaign of World War II, fought on the island of Saipan in the Mariana Islands from 15 June–9 July 1944. The Allied invasion fleet embarking the expeditionary forces left Pearl Harbor on 5 June 1944, the day before Operation Overlord in Europe was launched.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Saipan
In the campaigns of 1943 and the first half of 1944, the Allies had captured the Solomon Islands, the Gilbert Islands, the Marshall Islands and the Papuan Peninsula of New Guinea. This left the Japanese holding the Philippines, the Caroline Islands, Palau Islands and Mariana Islands.
It had always been the intention of the American planners to bypass the Carolines and Palaus and to seize the Marianas and Taiwan. From these latter bases communications between the Japanese homeland and Japanese forces to the south and west could be cut. In addition, from the Marianas Japan would be well within the range of an air offensive relying on the new Boeing B-29 Superfortress long-range bomber with its operational radius of 1,500 mi (2,400 km).
United States Imperial Japan
Strength
71,000 31,000
Casualties and losses
3,426 killed 24,000 killed
10,364 wounded 5,000 suicides
921 prisoners
10,000 civilians dead (mostly suicides)
In the night of June 16, 1944, the Imperial Army command center of Saipan luanched the all-out offensive with 8,000 soldiers and 44 tanks. To encounter them, American troops concentrated overwhelming fire power, delivering 800 rounds per hour from cannons and 10,000 bullets per hour from machine guns. Accordingly most of Japanese sodiers were killed. The Japanese tank regiment consisting of 800 sodiers lost about 770. One suvivor later said that he fired more than 2,000 bullets from a machine gun of his tank, but Americans fired ten times more.
The worst incident in the Battle of Saipan was that many Japanese citizens, like Japanese soldiers, were afraid of being captured alive by US forces. They opted to commit suicide. It is reported that one day more than 70 citizens killed themselves so as not to live as captives to be subjected to humiliating treatment.
After occupation of Saipan, the US military captured and protected 14,949 noncombatants, including 10,424 Japanese, 1,300 Koreans, and other Pacific islanders. It is estimated that about 10,000 Japanese citizens were killed in this battle.
After the Battle of Saipan, the Imperial military continued to lose its strongholds and occupied areas from other parts of Mariana Islands, Iwo-Jima Island, the Philippines, and Okinawa.
The hot summer of 1945 is still partly alive in Japan or in Japanese mind sets of today, since battles were so furious and victims were so huge in the number.
http://zapanet.info/blog/item/1670
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Mar 6:14 And king Herod heard of him; (for his name was spread abroad:) and he said, That John the Baptist was risen from the dead, and therefore mighty works do shew forth themselves in him.
Mar 6:15 Others said, That it is Elias. And others said, That it is a prophet, or as one of the prophets.
Mar 6:16 But when Herod heard thereof, he said, It is John, whom I beheaded: he is risen from the dead.